Fall’s Fresh Faces

Amy Freed, 39, playwright

Look for: “Freedomland,” a new play commissioned by South Coast Repertory and premiering there Oct. 17. It’s a dark comic play about a family falling apart at the seams. At the head is a laissez faire patriarch who has a new wife committed to sexual freedom. Of his two thirtysomething daughters, one is successful--she’s an avant-garde artist who paints hobo clowns and has a magazine writer following her around--and one is not. Their rivalry is palpable, but it is their brother who comes to reveal a different, darker rage.

Why she matters: Freed is the author of “The Psychic Life of Savages,” which played the Wooly Mammoth Theatre in Washington last year, where it won the prestigious Joseph Kesselring Award as well as D.C.’s Charles McArthur Award for outstanding new play. The Washington Post called “Savages” a “ferally brilliant satire” and the Washington Times said it was “wickedly funny.” Given SCR’s extraordinary track record for commissioning new work, “Freedomland” could be another in a line of important debuts.